of Brunswick on the throne by the free voice of the people of Great Britain, all are but declaratory Laws, not professing to give what the people had not before, but merely to assure rights which had been theirs in all time past.
The wisdom of this example, although duly appreciated here, could not be imitated exactly in our country; but it taught a lesson which American Patriots improved. The monarchy of England was of an origin so ancient, as to defy any search for its primitive foundations. The prerogatives of the Crown and the privileges of the People both rested upon the same base, immemorial usage. All the declarations of what these were and ever had been, (no matter how such declarations were obtained,) proceeded from an existing and acknowledged sovereign, seeming at least to limit its own power by declaring it. But the American assertion of Independence, in dissolving our connection with the government of the mother country, left us no substitute for that, and so imposed upon us the necessity of establishing a new government for ourselves. A government thus created, could have no powers derivable from custom: could have no authorities but such as should be bestowed upon it in terms, by its creators. While these creators, in the very fact of establishing a new government for themselves, thereby asserted and manifested their pre-existing Right to do so. Hence, it resulted, and from necessity too, that while all the Powers of all our governments are derivative and temporary, the Rights of those who created these governments are self-existent and eternal.
Therefore, in each of these United States, the People by whom all our governments were created and established, are the only legitimate Sovereign. Governors and Magistrates of all sorts, are but the agents and servants of these their creators, appointed to attain the good of the People, by the exercise of the powers and authorities granted to them for that purpose by the People, and responsible to the People for the manner in which all these duties have been performed or neglected. In the relations between such a Sovereign and such its agents, the idea of a compact of any kind, can find no place. In governments whose powers rest upon force, the victor sovereign may grant to its vanquished subjects, rights and immunities, which being designed for the benefit of
